VomitComet

Ooo! Driving the Blind Driver Challenge Vehicle sounds like fun! Can I do it? Can I can I can I? Please? I personally would have to take a hell of a lot of training to feel confident out on the road, but this sounds like a cool idea. I'd at least enjoy driving it around the obstacle course.

I did catch one piece of irony. they hope to build it into an electric car...like a soundless one? Like the kind we're all kinda afraid of? Please, please put some sound on this one! I don't think we want driving blinks silently killing their pedestrian fellows.

I wish these folks well. Maybe some day, we'd be able to drive ourselves around. Wacky!

You live in the building with me, and have for at least as long as I've had Trixie. You're a little dog. In fact, I can hold your head in one hand. I don't know what kind of dog you are, but you're small. What exactly is your issue with Trixie? If I'm out alone, like if I go to the pool and I see you, you're as docile as docile can be. But if you can see Trixie from half-way across the parking lot, you start to strain on your flexi...why your owner walks you on a flexi in the parking lot I'll never understand...but anyway. You strain on your flexi and gr'r'r'r'r'r'rowl, gr'r'r'r'rowl, roof! roofroofroofroof! Gr'r'r'r'r'r'rooof! What are you, the new Teddy? But Teddy just barked at everything. You seem to have it in for Trixie. Why?

When I first used to meet you, I just thought you wanted to meet her and play. But you've been making it clear lately that you don't want to play, you want to defend your territory. For the past few mornings and evenings, I've had the misfortune of meeting you while taking Trixie out for her business, and your response has been the same. Gr'r'r'r'r'rooof! Roofroofroofroof! Gr'r'r'r'r'r'r'ooof! You would never know by that giant bark that if Trixie wanted to, she could eat you for breakfast.

A few months ago, when your owner thought it would be fun to let her little nephew hold you, you broke away, broke for Trixie, and I think tried to get underneath her and start biting at her. I couldn't move because it was so slippery and icy. Then your owner came and scooped you up, apologizing profusely. I was glad she came, but mad that she didn't act faster. I mean, I had about 30 seconds of warning that you were going to get away. I could hear you straining on that blasted flexi as hard as you could. All Trixie was doing was taking a damn crap!

Do you do this with all dogs, or do you just hate Trixie? What in hell did she ever do to you? If you do this with all dogs, you may meet an untimely end. You're too small for that crap. I know, you have to make up for your size somehow, but actually physically attacking another dog who outweighs you by a lot is probably not a good idea. go take some obedience classes or something, and leave us alone! Contrary to what you think, this building *is* big enough for all of us.

Hoping We can be friends,

Carin and Trixie

Baby Born On NYC Mass Transit For 2nd Straight Day

Congratulations to the family, and happyGroundhog Day.

I'd like to ask a favour of all the parents in the crowd. Please, when your kid turns 1, stop giving out his age in months. It sounds ridiculous. whenever I hear one of you say that little William or Betty is 14 months old instead of a year and a bit or 18 months instead of a year and a half it makes me want to hit something, specifically you for coming off so...I guess pretentiously would be the word, as if your child is far too important for conventional units of measure. I once had a mother tell me when I asked that her boy was 24 months old. Seriously, how stupid is that,and who talks that way? A person's age, though it involves numbers, should not be a math equation that I am required to solve. The answer to the question should be the answer to the question, not deflected back at me in the form of another question in a subject I'mbad at. The kid's 2, no need to make it complicated. You don't hear me going around telling people that I'm 355 months old, because that would be dumb. Hmmm, maybe I should start whipping that one out on the baby people to make a point.

This excerpt from Figure Four Weekly is great. In just a few short lines, it answers a question that a lot of people including me have spent a lot of time trying to answer but never nailing down quite so well. Why does Triple H irritate the hell out of so many wrestling fans?

by the way, if you are a wrestling fan, you need to subscribe to theF4W/Wrestling Observer siteright now. Value for your money doesn't even begin to describe this place. For all you get, they could charge twice the price and it would still be more than worth it.

Watching Hunter walk to the back was a funny thing. He was there holding onto his belt for dear life, and I don't even think the cameras were on him. And I just thought, does having the belt really mean that much to the guy, still, after all these years? People have often asked my why, say, Shawn Michaels doesn't get another run with the title, and what bullshit that is, and I always answer, "To be honest, I don't think he gives a fuck." Shawn got into the business wanting to be a superstar and a champion, he achieved that, and I think that at this stage in his career a belt is just something heavy that he would have to carry through security at the airport. When I was a little kid I wanted to become a wrestler and win a BELT, and during my career I won a few, including the Texarkana Title. This made me happy because a person who lived on the other side of the country trusted me enough to lose to me with the assumption that at some point I would come back and return the favor, which I did. It was a fun six months and I made wacky banners on our Web site to celebrate the victory and we did promos on the radio show and that sort of thing, and the key is that in the end I was satisfied that I had accomplished such a thing in my small career. I could work for 100 more years and never "win" another belt and I would be fine with that. And I look at Hunter and I wonder why he has this need to continually have THE BELT. I mean, what has really been accomplished with this 13th title win? It's not like this time he actually defeated someone in legitimate athletic competition. It would be one thing if this was a period where it was actually an honor to be the champion in that you were the guy the company trusted to carry the ball, and holding that belt was a huge responsibility. I could even understand if it was most anyone else, like a Jeff Hardy, who also grew up wanting to be a champion and found the company he worked for thought enough of him to give him that honor. But for HHH in 2009, he's working in a company where the belt changes hands so many times that the champion is hardly the guy the company is built around, he doesn't carry all the responsibility for success or failure on his shoulders because no one man today makes that much of a difference, and it can't even feel like that much of an honor to get it when your father-in-law runs the place and your wife writes the storylines. I guess in the end what he grew up wanting was to be Ric Flair, and the most important thing to him remains equaling or surpassing Flair's title record. And I guess to people who don't know anything about wrestling that will be a big deal when it happens. But to the people who do, who know what an accomplishment it was for Flair to be awarded all those titles by all those different promoters all over the world for all those years, every title Hunter is awarded by his family will make him look like an even bigger mark, which I'm pretty sure is not the legacy he was hoping for as a child.

A while ago I talked about sketchy doctors treating folks in sketchy places. Well, we can add Donnie Hendrix and his silicone injections to the list. Yeah, the guy gave silicone injections out of his bedroom, and killed a woman when somehow, while injecting her hips, silicone filled her lungs. How that happens, I don't know, but an even better question is why are people allowing this guy to shoot them full of stuff when signs point to this guy not being areal doctor.

And calling Jill, er, anyone who wants to describe this guy...exactly how hard is it to tell whether he's a man or a woman?

Dr. Denis Walsh has a lot of balls telling women how much pain they should or shouldn't go through when having a baby. I figure until he can pop a baby out of himself, he doesn't have a right to speak about how much pain a mother should go through. Sure he makes a few good points about moms who have epidurals not being able to do as much during the birthing process and needing more help, but he should watch his step when telling a mom that the pain is a rite of passage. He may learn a lot about pain if he tells the wrong woman that little gem.

This reminds me of a family doctor I used to have. He had no problem telling older people that their pain was just part of getting older and he wouldn't investigate it. But when he suddenly had his own pain to deal with, then it was a big deal. I think this guy is the same. the sad part is he'll never go through having a baby, so he will never learn anything that might change his mind.

Here's a study I'd like to be a fly on the wall for.

A group of volunteers were asked to put their hands in freezing water for as long as they could. during one trial, they were asked to say a random word, and in the other trial, they were asked to use a swear word of their choice. they could keep their hand in the cold water for longer while swearing. I keep imagining what would happen if Steve's dad was chosen for the study. The study authors could learn new, creative words like cockhump.

I have one problem with the study. The swearers had to keep using the same swear word. I don't know about you, but when I've just done something that hurts, I say a whole pile of different ones. I wonder if that has anything to do with the suppression of pain. They should have had 3 conditions: the random word condition, the stick to one swear word condition and the make 'em up as you go condition. Maybe they'll do that next time. Then Steve's dad could have real fun.

wow. Just a little over a year after a dude mistook the moon for a UFO, an elderly woman mistook the fireplace channel for her TV being on fire. thank god she didn't try to throw water on her TV first. Then she would have had a real emergency.

Is this the type of guy who doesn't follow instructions well? Does he buy a piece of furniture with numbered pieces and then just grab random pieces and try to put them together? I would imagine so, since he can't get three steps in order. The three steps were supposed to be

1. rob armoured vehicle.
2. speed off in getaway car.
3. At another location, swap cars and set fire to getaway vehicle.

But somehow, he thought it should have gone like this.

1. Park getaway car near armoured vehicle and set fire to it.
2. rob armoured vehicle.
3. Run away. Run, run, run!

you can guess how that went. He got arrested, and his car, the evidence he was hoping to destroy, was taken as evidence.

Burin, Newfoundland resident Stewart Brenton, 47, has become the first case of truly appropriate drunk driving sentencing I've ever heard of.

Back in June, Brenton appeared in court on charges of driving while impaired, flight from police and driving while disqualified. He was convicted and as part of his sentence, he was slapped witha 99 year driving ban.

I'm not sure how many previous convictions he's had, but I've heard plenty of stories of people on their 8th or 9th impaired that don't end up like this one did. The judge who tried this case is my new hero. Like the title of the post says, that's how it's done...or at least how it needs to be done more often.

Next time you find 3 men sitting in a car full of laptops, cell phones and digital cameras and you decide you want to buy some, it would be good to look in the bag they hand you, especially after giving them about $866 U.S. If you don't, you may find out you just paid for some pretty expensive potatoes.

this reminds me of the story of the Marijuana that was broccoli.

There's not a whole lot to say about the all-star game. It was fine, I had fun, what more can you ask for? It wasn't the best night to be a starting pitcher, but in the end the right team won so it's all good.

One thing I did notice, at least I think I noticed it and it wasn't all of our imaginations was how loud the booing was for President Obama when he came out to throw the first pitch. It was kind of like the reaction that John Cena sometimes gets in WWE where some people cheer and some people boo, then the booing gets louder, so the cheering people try to out scream the booers only to have them get louder in response and so on and so forth. I didn't hear this, but Carin told me that the announcers on the feed we were watching said that it might have had to do with the Chicago White Sox jacket he was wearing. I don't think I'm buying that. If the fans wanted to boo somebody for wearing another team's clothing, they could have booed just about everybody. It's the all-star game, for crying out loud. There are plenty of chances to boo anybody who's not from the team you like, but it sounded like for the most part people were respectful of the players no matter who they played for and the only one who came close to getting booed out of the place was Obama.

So here's my question to any Americans who feel like trying to answer it. Is Obama starting to lose some of that god like status he had around election time or was this a fluke? I know he's made some decisions I personally don't like, but I'm not sure I'd be ready to boo him just yet. But not being in America it's harder to read the pulse of the people, so is the general feeling about him changing as folks realize that he's just another politician and that they may have fallen for the marketing?

Incidentally, I was disappointed with Obama's pitch. Not because it was particularly bad, but because he didn't throw a changeup we can believe in. Thank you, thankyouverymuch!

Um...yeah. Something tells me that line was a lot funnier when I was buzzed and full of fried chicken. Oh well, what can you do?

On Tuesday, Steve said he was going to write a letter to the editor about an editorial he saw about the calling of bus stops. Well, it got in. I wrote one too, and it also made it in. I think his was better, but oh well. At least we both got to hit some points.

The poor Mercury is starting to figure out that these two blinks do live at the same place, because they only called once and verified that we each did write a letter, instead of calling, asking for one of us, and then calling again and going "Ah crap, if I'd realized you were both at the same number, I would have gotten both letters verified at once."

Hopefully the letters make people think. I can't guarantee it, but at least we tried.

I figure while I'm ranting, I might as well get both of my small complaints out of the way first.

Steve finally got himself a new cell phone, the same one I got a couple years ago, and while I'm largely happy with how smooth it was for him to get his hands on the phone, I'm a little saddened by a couple of things.

First, they sent it with a version of Talks that's a couple of versions behind. It's no big deal, you can upgrade for fre, but why not at least start him off with the most up to date Talks? I mean, the phone's a bit old, why not at least have the newest compatible version of the screen-reader on it?

And second, how come when I got mine, they sent manuals for Talks as well as a sheet of braille detailing what all I should find in the box, and he got none of that? Did they only have a finite number of copies of the manual and braille sheets? It was just a little worrysome and had us wondering whether or not he really got the phone with the Talks preinstalled. Luckily once we got the phone together, it spoke immediately. but still, that little touch of including the manuals was kind of nice. I kind of understand why they stopped sending the braille since sadly, less people are braille-users, but the manuals would have been a nice reassurance that we did get what we asked for, since not all of the Rogers folk know the difference between Nokia 6682 and Nokia 6682RVI. Thankfully, more of them do than did before, so that's great.

But, all things considered, it's a good phone, and we got Talks for a sweet deal. They said he could upgrade in a year to another phone if he wanted. At least it brought the starting price of Talks down, which is very cool.

I said this rant was small. I guess it was.

Here's a puzzler for ya. How come almost every single media outlet that has a community events listings area doesn't have a little section where they explain where people can send their listings, how long they need to be, etc? I'm part of a committee that wants to send press releases out about events coming up, and I was supposed to find out how to send them to various newspapers, radio stations, etc. And only one newspaper had a thing that told folks where to send their event info.

Good god! You'd think the media would want to cut down on the number of confused folks calling them wondering how they could get their event listed. Why would they want to make it harder? When I asked some of them about it, all they did was stammer.

Thankfully, once I did get a hold of people, getting the info was very easy. But gees! Why not make things just a wee touch simpler for everyone?

For the life of me, I cannot get this song out of my head. And try as she might, Carin can't either. So I'm posting it here to share the love, and to show that not every song we write about here is complete suck.

This one comes from Sean Cullen of Corky and the Juice pigs fame (yes, the Gay Eskimo guys). It's a hilarious take on bands like Creed and how they have somehow managed to make Wheay into a word. He nails the style perfectly, much better than the bands themselves. It sounds like faint praise I know, but the way he pulls it off is really something.

the only version I could find online has a slight glitch at the beginning so the first few words are missing. For the record, the line is "when I see how much ya love me, it makes me say wheay!"Sean Cullen - Wheay!

This track comes from the album I am A Human Man, which you can buyherefrom CDBaby.

World Death Rate Holding Steady At 100 Percent

Death, a metabolic affliction causing total shutdown of all life functions, has long been considered humanity's number one health concern. Responsible for 100 percent of all recorded fatalities worldwide, the condition has no cure.

This editorial about why bus drivers shouldn't have to call out stopsirritated me so much that I had to write a letter about it. It hasn't been published yet, but here's what I wrote. By the way,hereis a post that Carin wrote last year expressing similar frustrations to give you an idea of how long this has been going on.

Dear Editor,

As a blind bus rider, I take issue with your editorial Let bus drivers focus on the road, published in Monday's Mercury.

I have to wonder if it was penned by somebody who has ever bothered to ride a bus in Guelph on a regular basis.  My guess is no, because clearly there is little or no understanding of what actually goes on on some of these busses.  Drivers carrying on long conversations with riders or even on their cell phones is something that happens routinely, and no thought is seemingly given to either of these things distracting the driver from the task at hand.  That being the case, how is announcing your current location for the benefit of a segment of your ridership any worse?  The mind boggles.  As a bus driver, it's your job to know where you are, so why is it so hard to tell me?

In the editorial you also state that "the practice of asking your driver to let you know when your stop is coming up is the solution."  That's fine and many times it works, but many times it doesn't.  I wish I had a nickel for every time myself or a friend has been forgotten about and missed a stop.  I would be getting close to having the money to buy my own car and hire a driver so I wouldn't have to take the bus anymore.  And what do you suppose is the main reason myself and other blind folks get forgotten about on a bus?  That would be those long conversations with other riders or with somebody on the cell phone that in the eyes of the paper either don't happen or aren't a big deal and not distracting to the drivers at all.

I'm not writing this letter to slag all bus drivers.  I thank all of them who have called out stops and who have not forgotten to let me off where I ask.  Your efforts are truly appreciated.  I write in the hopes that drivers who complain and folks like those at the paper who don't understand what stop calling means to people like me from an independence and efficiency standpoint will start to realize the importance of this issue.

Steve Wettlaufer,
Guelph

It's amazing that it doesn't take us long to come up with another pack of ads that deserve mention. Here we go.

They have these new Ford commercials telling you that you should really drive a Ford, and one of the big things they're all proud of is how much electronic stuff is packed into the car. The one girl says "Look at the dash, it's all digital." Uh, no. That is a reverse selling point for me. What car was it that we owned that backed into a store window on its own, despite all kinds of human attempts to get it to stop? Why, that would be a Ford Arrostar. It was one of the most digital cars we ever owned. I don't want my dash to be all digital. I don't want the car thinking too much on its own. Plus, when it breaks, now you have to take it in to a Ford guy because noone else will touch all that fancy electronics. but of course, that's what Ford wants.

There's a commercial for these Off mosquito coils that says something really dumb. It says the coils kill mosquitos that may carry the West Nile virus. So it only kills the ones that *may* carry it, but those who do and those who don't are fine. Ok then.

Every time I see this ad for Mike's hard Lemonade, I giggle. Part of it is it's just funny watching that lisping guy's voice traverse several octaves and then say "I don't usually...scream like...that." And part of it is I think it's great that someone's making fun of Coors and their certified cold bottle. Seriously, do you need to be told when your beer is cold?

There was this commercial that I would see, and all it would say was "Good morning, homies. You know, that dog should really be on a leash. Minding my own business...not my forte, but that is." Thanks to this hilarious article, I now know that it's for the Kia Forte. But all I kept thinking every time I saw it is "what's wrong with telling those idiots with their growling, off-leash dog to put the beast back on a leash?" Never mind that the guy doing the telling looks like a total dork. Yup, I've had a dog too long.

The Wireless Wave ads never make any sense to me. They tell you that if you don't love your phone, you need a new one, so come into Wireless Wave. And then the end says "Wireless Wave. Love your Phone." But if you love your phone, why would you want to come into Wireless Wave?

This lame ad for Pizza Hut's tuscani pastas is scraping the bottom of the stupid barrel. Were they planning for people to see right through this one as an obviously stupid commercial, or were they hoping that people would actually believe the plot? I can't find a video to show you, so I will do my level best to explain it. They tell you that they blindfolded a family and told them that they took them out to a fancy Italian restaurant, when really, they're eating Pizza Hut pasta in their own home. Then you hear the family chowing down, surrounded by silence, saying things like "mmm you can really taste the parmesan cheese." or something equally stupid. Then they say something like imagine their surprise when we showed them the truth. They ask them "Where do you think you are right now?" The family says "An Italian restaurant." Oh please. there was no music, no fellow patrons, no clinking of forks and knives, not to mention they probably had to let themselves back into their own house and they're sitting at their own table, which I'm sure even the dumbest of the dumb would recognize blindfolded. the blindfolds are lifted, and there's a collective gasp and scream. Oh come on.

During my search for the video, I found a whole forum thread on this stupidity, in which I found a funny take on the commercial.

I can only imagine what the neighbors were thinking when they saw the family being led blindfolded into their home by strange men. "Look honey! The Sullivans are being kidnapped and held hostage by Pizza Hut! Call 911!"

And if that wasn't enough stupidity, the announcer makes a big thing about how the pastas are "restaurant quality". Well Pizza Hut is a restaurant, is it not? So I sincerely hope the pastas are restaurant-quality.

Steve and I were watching wrestling, and a promo came on for the WWE Kids magazine. Among the things kids could do in this magazine, they could navigate a "mind-numbing maze". Both of us at the same time said "Mind-numbing?" I would have understood brain-teasing, or mind-bending, or brain-twisting, but mind-numbing? To me, that means the maze is so boring that you can feel your brain transforming into a pile of mush as you stare blankly at it and plod through it. Will they next advertise that the maze is insipid? How about vapid? People, choice of words is key!

This Marineland commercial has always bugged me. It says: "they come from a land of ice and snow, now belugas have a home in Arctic Cove." Translation: They were once free...until we captured 'em and put 'em on display for your amusement. Hmmm. That commercial doesn't make me want to see the belugas, it makes me sad for them. I mean, we already knew that, but having it pointed out to us doesn't seem like a good advertising plan.

I wonder if they had the kids and the guy who do the radio spot for Marineland watch that Arctic Cove ad one too many times. They just sound so depressed and miserable. Maybe they're sad for the belugas. I wish I could find a copy, but it's a radio ad and I've only heard it while listening to Blue Jays games, so I wouldn't know where to look.

There's something seriously wrong with the slogan for hotwire.com. It says "five-star hotels, two-star prices." So the hotels may be great, but you'll end up paying a really shitty price for them. I know what they really mean, but my brain keeps thinking the other thing.

One last thing. We've noticed that they've taken that horrible gum commercial off the air...you know the one with the singing teeth. For that, we say...thank you!

And that's it for now. I'm sure we'll have another one of these before too long.